CBD Tinctures and Wellness: How to use CBD for Meditation and Yoga CBD has many medical applications for those suffering from illness and disease, but can it be part of a wellness routine too? What are some benefits of CBD tinctures (How to Buy CBD Oil Tinctures) for those of us practicing our ohm? Let’s take a closer look at how CBD can enhance our body and mind wellness connection. CBD Tinctures and Yoga I like to think that if you could bottle up yoga, it would be CBD tincture. CBD yoga is a resurgence of an ancient trend that marries the healing effects of yoga with the healing effects of CBD into a perfect package of overall wellness. CBD and yoga share many of the same health benefits including reducing chronic pain, improving sleep, increasing focus, and even promoting muscle recovery. How Can CBD Enhance Your Yoga Practice? Adding CBD tincture to your yoga practice can help you achieve deeper relaxation and, as a result, a deeper focus into your meditative state and potentially move you deeper into poses. As we know, CBD is a cannabinoid that binds to endocannabinoid receptors located throughout our bodies and provides many health benefits through this binding effect. Research has shown that stretching, like the way we do when practicing yoga, actually activates endocannabinoids, which can potentially allow greater stimulation from CBD. In short, when we add CBD to our yoga practice, our bodies are more open to using the CBD in our tissue and fascia. It’s like painting a room with a primer before the color. Everything works much better. Over time, this additional CBD boost can lead to deeper poses, faster recovery, and greater flexibility. Taking the CBD as a tincture is ideal for yoga as it is quick acting so you don’t need to time out your dosing in order to fit with your workout. The Mind/Body Connection Practitioners of yoga often attribute their exercise to an increased relaxed state and lower stress levels. Focused breathing, holding poses, and clearing the mind are all tenants of yoga and a CBD tincture can enhance them tenfold. We know CBD improves sleep and aids with relaxation, however, did you know CBD is also an antioxidant? When our bodies are overcome with oxidative stress, an imbalance between the free radicals and antioxidants in our body, CBD can help repair the damage done to the cells affected. How exactly does this work? Let’s break it down a little further. Free Radicals and Oxidative Stress Free radicals are molecules that contain oxygen and have an odd number of electrons. This odd number means they can easily react with other molecules in the body as they receive donations of electrons. Because they are capable of making so many reactions, they can cause large scale chemical reactions throughout our bodies. While free radicals are required for certain things like fighting pathogens, too many can pose a real threat to our health. A vital process, oxidation occurs, for example, when our bodies convert food to energy. In short, when we eat food, our body metabolizes the food and converts it to energy. This process releases free radicals, which are normally controlled by various enzymes. However, when too many free radicals are being created or introduced to our bodies through things like pollution, sugar, deep fried food, cigarettes, etc., our bodies can no longer keep up and a process known as oxidative stress occurs. Oxidative stress is responsible for damaging fatty tissue, proteins, and even our DNA. This can lead to conditions like diabetes, hypertension, inflammatory diseases, Alzheimer’s and cancer. Oxidation stress is also responsible for the aging process. Antioxidants and Oxidation Stress Now that we understand free radicals, let’s dig into antioxidants. Antioxidants are the antidote to free radicals. These molecules are capable of ending the chain reactions caused by the free radicals by giving up one of their electrons to neutralize them. Interestingly, when this occurs, it converts the antioxidant into a free radical itself and this is why we need to eat foods rich in antioxidants. There are also several enzymes within our bodies that work to neutralize free radicals, most notably vitamin E, C, and beta-carotene. When we have a nutrient-rich diet, we give our bodies a better chance to fight off oxidation stress. Without the addition of antioxidants to our bodies, the free radicals take over and wreak havoc on our system. What Does Yoga Have To Do With Oxidative Stress? Now that we’re caught up in the science of oxidative stress we can look at the connection between CBD, yoga, and our bodies. Studies have shown that regular yoga practice not only helps relieve stress, it can also help lower inflammatory markers and prevent diseases that increase inflammation. In other words, yoga can also help with oxidative stress. When you’re physically feeling better, you’re more easily able to handle stress loads and, since CBD is a natural antioxidant, adding the use of a CBD tincture to your yoga routine can further help relieve the oxidative stress occurring in your body and result in a healthier you. It’s important to note that the antioxidants added to foods and supplements are rarely effective. There is little scientific proof that they benefit our bodies at all in that form. CBD, however, is a natural product that is bioavailable and as such, can be readily absorbed into the body and can have a greater impact on free radicals. The Feeling of Zen One of the major reasons people gravitate towards yoga is to bring a greater sense of balance and relaxation to their life. Yogis, the trainers leading yoga classes, take great care in creating a calm and safe atmosphere where practitioners can focus, breathe, and meditate throughout their routine. Despite all their best efforts, it can still be challenging to leave everything you enter the studio with outside the door. This is where a dose of CBD tincture can really provide a boost of focus and intention. CBD provides a deep relaxation, a sense of overall well-being, and increases focus thanks to its role in binding to serotonin, anandamide, and dopamine. Being able to truly focus and meditate will not only improve the immediate effects of your yoga workout, it will also contribute to long-term feelings of happiness and serenity as you reach deeper levels of self-awareness and reach your personal yoga goals. One New Yorker describes her experience at a CBD Yoga studio saying, “I’m not quite sure where the yoga ends and the CBD begins.” This sums up the seamless benefits of CBD and yoga. Complimenting each other so well that it’s impossible to know where one ends and one begins. For more detailed information on the benefits of CBD for treating pain, stress, anxiety, nausea and aiding sleep, be sure to check out this informative blog post.
